HMD Takes Online Route To Expand Nokia’s Reach In India

HMD Global has announced its own online store to market Nokia-branded smartphones in India. The company plans to sell its entire range of Android-powered smartphones, feature phones and accessories via Nokia.com. Its announcement was made at an event on Wednesday where the 2018 lineup of Nokia smartphones were announced in the country, however, the store has been live since a couple of weeks with last-gen Nokia devices listed. Being an under-penetrated market, the South Asian country offers a great growth opportunity for the Finnish smartphone maker that began its operations a little over a year ago. The report adds that in the following two years, HMD aims to grab a spot among the top three smartphone makers in India, which currently has its market dominated by Chinese players with Nokia nowhere to be seen in the top five positions, according to a recent industry analysis report.

For selling Nokia smartphones via a brand-owned store, HDM Global had to fulfill the condition of locally assembling its products. Nokia smartphones and feature phones have been made locally since its debut in the country last year with its entire portfolio now being assembled in India. Nokia currently partners with online retailers including Flipkart and Amazon to market its products, besides having an extensive offline presence, and its new online store will function alongside these partners. HMD Global will also be tapping the enterprise market in India with its latest line of smartphones besides upping its retail sales. It has partnered with HCL Infosystems to implement this plan, which will also carry out product deliveries in major Indian cities that are expected to bring the initial sales for the new Nokia store.

The Nokia brand owner HMD Global seems quite bullish for the Indian market, which was evident when it launched three smartphones together in the market earlier this week. HMD’s first Android Go smartphone Nokia 1 was announced along with the Nokia 8 Sirocco, Nokia 7 Plus and the Nokia 6 (2018) and all of them will go on sale by the end of April. The 4G-enabled Nokia 8110 feature phone should be launched in the country next month, as per the report. All of these devices will be available for sale via Nokia’s online store.

Karan joined AndroidHeadlines in early 2018 and has since been involved in covering day-to-day news around the Android ecosystem and related fields. He started writing in 2014 with a focus on consumer technology and held positions at a couple of online news portals prior to his association with AndroidHeadlines. Being based in India, Karan has a better understanding of the local industry and market that helps him come out with more insightful reporting. Contact him at [email protected]